A. Fair - Gold Comes in Bricks

I got up and put on my hat and coat. “I’m going to take your coupe. You can go home in a taxi. I’ll be seeing you in the morning.”

“Not until then?”

“No.”

“Donald, I’m worried about this. How about coming by my apartment later on?”

“I will,” I said, “if anything turns up.”

She reached in the desk drawer. I could tell from the slope of her shoulder and the rigid angle of her arm that she had her fingers clasped around the neck of the whisky bottle all ready to lift it out as soon as I’d left the office.

“Good-night, lover,” she said.

I walked out.

I made a figure eight around a couple of blocks, found out I wasn’t being followed, and started down to Tenth and Central. I spotted Esther Clarde walking along on Central, midway between Eighth and Ninth, but didn’t give her a tumble. I ran around the block twice to make certain she wasn’t being followed. When she got to Tenth and Central, I picked her up.

“Everything all clear?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Was that you in the car that went by a couple of times just now?”

“Yes.”

“I thought it was. I didn’t want to seem interested. No one on my tail, is there?”

“No.”

“What kind of a job did I do for you tonight?”

“Swell.”

“Grateful?”

“Uh-huh.”

“How grateful?”

“What do you want?”

“I thought perhaps you could do something for me.”

“Perhaps I can.”

She said, “I want to get out of here.”

“Out of where?”

“Out of the city. Out of the country. Away.”

“From what?”

“From everything.”

“Why?”

“I’m in a jam.”

“How come?”

“You know, the police. They’ll get after me. Honestly, Donald, I don’t know what made me do what I did tonight. I guess it was because you were so decent to me — I just couldn’t rat on you to the bulls.”

“All right,” I said. “Go home and forget it.”

“No, I can’t. They’ll check up on me.”

“How?”

“With Walter.”

“The night clerk?”

“Yes.”

“What about him?”

“He’ll identify you.”

“Not if you tell him not to.”

“What makes you say that?”

I had been driving aimlessly. Now I pulled in to the kerb, and stopped where I could look at her face while I was talking, “He’s pretty sweet on you.”

“He’s frightfully jealous.”

“You don’t need to tell him the truth. Just tell him that I’m not the man.”

“No, that won’t work. He’d be suspicious — think I had a crush on you or something. It would make him all the worse.”

“How much,” I asked, “do you want?”

“It isn’t a question of money. I want to get out of here. I want to take a plane for South America. I can take care of myself after I get there, but I need some get-away money, and I need somebody to engineer it who’s smart, someone who knows the ropes. You can do it.”

I said, “Try again, Esther.”

Her eyes raised to mine. For a moment there was glittering hatred in them. “You mean that after all I’ve done for you, you won’t do it?”

“No. It isn’t that. Try again telling me why you want to leave.”

“It’s just as I told you.”

“No, it isn’t.”

She was silent for a while, then she said, “It’s not safe for me here.”

“Why?”

“They’ll— I’ll— The same thing that happened to Jed will happen to me.”

“You mean they’ll kill you?”

“Yes.”

“Who?”

“I’m not mentioning any names.”

I said, “I’m not going into it blind.”

“I went into it blind for you.”

“Is it Crumweather?” I asked.

She gave a quick start when I mentioned his name, then shifted her eyes and didn’t look at me for five or ten seconds. She was staring down at the illuminated dials on the dashboard of the car. “All right,” she said after a while. “Let’s say it’s Crumweather.”

“What about him?”

She said, “That business with Alta Ashbury was all planted. They intended to sell her two-thirds of the letters. The other one-third that had all the damaging things in them was to go to Crumweather.”

“What was he going to do with them?”

“He was going to make Alta Ashbury kick through with everything he needed to get Lasster acquitted.”

“You know about him?”

“Of course.”

“And about Alta Ashbury?”

She nodded.

“Go ahead.”

“Crumweather was going to make the last shakedown. The first two payments went to someone else.”

“And Jed Ringold gave her the third batch of letters,” I asked, “and double-crossed everyone?”

“No. That’s the funny part of it. He didn’t. He only gave her an envelope with some hotel stationery in it.”

“Did you know he was going to do that?”

“No. No one knew it. It was a racket Jed thought up for himself. He thought he could pocket the money and get out, but — things just didn’t work that way.”

“Where’s that batch of those letters now?”

“I don’t know. No one knows. Jed played along all right for a while, and then he got ideas of his own. I told him it was dangerous.”

“You were Jed’s woman?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Why, the idea of saying things like that to me!”

“You were, weren’t you?”

She met my eyes, then glanced away and didn’t say anything.

“You were, weren’t you?”

She waited a moment, then said, “Yes,” in a voice that was almost a whisper.

“All right, let’s go on from there. When the officers came up to your apartment tonight and pounded on the door and told you they were officers, and told you to open up, you were frightened stiff, weren’t you?”

“Of course I was. Anyone would have been under those circumstances.”

“You were in bed?”

She hesitated again, then said, “Yes. I’d just got to sleep.”

“You opened the door and came out into the corridor, and closed the door behind you?”

“Yes.”

“You had your keys with you?”

“Yes, in the pocket of my housecoat.”

I said, “The reason you were so frightened when you heard the police, the reason you didn’t let them go into your apartment and talk there, was because someone was in the apartment. Who was it?”

“No, no! I swear it wasn’t! I’m telling you the honest truth. It wasn’t the law. It was — something else.”

“When do you want to leave?”

“Right now.”

I lit a cigarette and didn’t say anything for quite a while. She was watching me anxiously. “Well?” she asked.

I said, “Okay, sister. I’ll have to get some money. I haven’t enough with me.”

“But you can get it?”

“Of course.”

“From Ashbury?”

“Yes.”

“When can you have it?”

“As soon as Ashbury gets back. He’s up north on a mining deal.”

“He was up with you?”

“Yes.”

“When will he be back?”

“He should be back almost any time. I don’t know whether he’ll drive back or take a plane.”

“Listen, Donald. As soon as he comes back, you arrange to get some money so I can leave. Will you do that for me?”

“I’ll take care of you.”

“But what am I going to do in the meantime?”

I said, “Let’s go to a hotel somewhere and register under an assumed name.”

“How about my clothes?”

“Leave them where they are. Just disappear.”

She thought for a while, and said, “I haven’t a cent with me.”

“I have some money. Enough to cover hotel bills, incidental expenses, and getting some new clothes.”